Monday, April 5, 2010

Coffee Talk

I remember when I was in primary school, I've always had this passion for reading. As soon as I discovered the library, that has been the place you will find me after school, before I had to rush off to catch my school bus. Being an "extremely" shy girl, I will always wait for the senior students to borrow whatever books there are in the library before I goes in and "sapu" whatever that's left. Hence, I always end up with books that are torn, without cover or with missing pages in between; the reason why no one was interested to borrow.

Being in a sekolah kebangsaan, there were plenty of Malay & English story books & magazines. One of my favorite magazine that has never failed to make my day is the Gila-Gila. And I remember those times when I was so caught up with certain story in it, but was unable to obtain the following month's publication (coz I was always grabbing the leftovers, remember?), it was soooooooooo.............. frustrating!! FYI, I do hear my niece telling me every now and then, that the will father sit in a corner sofa with a copy of Gila-Gila that I've supplied, and snickering to himself softly.

Now that I look back, even though the library was an extremely small one, that very library never failed to provide me with endless joy, information, entertainment and exposure, all of which was crucial to a child's imagination and in the development of our vocabulary. I'm not saying that my English or BM is A1, since working in the real world at times does not require such good and proper sentence formation (depends on which industry you are in), and that has not really helped me in maintaining what I have acquired, but it has certainly helped in my language papers without much effort in preparation.

My love for books didn't just end there. In my secondary school days, I remember bringing home, books that are as thick as the old Oxford Dictionary; that looks as old as probably one of Eintein's reference books (the older and thicker, the better), and my mom used to ask me if I actually understood what I was reading.

Something that looks like this....

I was capable of bringing those books home, reading them without fully understanding, but will still read them. As I read those long words and sentences, I always wonder what it means, I don't know why. And at times when I'm hardworking, I'll cross check the meaning in the dictionary, but more often than not, I'll just read on. And I actually saw this habit of mine exhibiting itself in my 2nd niece - the CD Girl @ Charmayne. She was doing exactly that in her early primary age.. :-D

Even now, whenever I know or anticipate I will have lots of time to kill, I will ensure I have something on hand to read; whether it's at the airport, in Penang, or even when I go for vacation or beach holiday. Always. And nothing beats reading a good book or magazine while you laze on the beach/patio/hut/balcony/hammock, sipping a cool drink. Bliss.....!! Just give me a book anytime, and you can be assured that I will not bother you even if the sky comes falling down.. ;-)

Hence, I love buying books and magazines for my nieces, just to ensure they do not run out of stuffs to read in their free time (something that I had to go thru in my younger days). They are lucky in the sense that they have someone to provide them endless supply of reading materials.

So imagine my joy when I discovered BookCross@1U (ref to my previous blog for details). I totally love this concept, as I feel that books should not be kept, but should be shared.